Pressure Swing

Distillation with Aspen

HYSYS
Breaking the azeotrope in ethanolwater system
Nov 21, 2012

2012 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved

Discussion of Azeotrope
Azeotrope occurs when
equilibrium line crosses x=y
line
Driving force for separation
goes to zero
Creates upper limit for purity
of one component in system
Purified component depends
on initial mix

2012 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved

Pressure Swing Distillation

Process Flow Diagram
(min Bp azeotrope)
Azeotrope composition
depends on pressure
P1

P2

Can be exploited to
cross azeotrope

After crossing the

azeotropic
composition, the other
component will be
purified

2012 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved

Problem Statement
Feed stream of 24,000 kg/h with 20 mol-% ethanol must be
separated
Product stream must contain >99 mol-% ethanol and be
>7,500 kg/h
Separation will be achieved using pressure swing distillation
with recycle

2012 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved

Copyright
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2012 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved